Tuesday, April 29, 2014: The tussle between US and India over the solar power policy is now likely to be settled by a dispute settlement panel. After the US approached the World Trade Organisation against country’s policy on sourcing the locally manufactured content by the solar power producers in the Jawaharlal Nehru Solar Mission. This complaint from the US has prompted Indian authorities to file a retaliartory complaint against the foreign nation’s ‘similarly restrictive policies in the sector in 13 of its states’ said an ET report.
The two nations have discussed the issue, but nothing concrete seems to have emerged, due to which the idea of setting up a dispute settlement panel within the WTO in May. The ET report quoted a commerce department official saying that the dispute settlement panel is being set up because the issue could not be resolved in the consultations.
The official revealed that India doesn’t conform to the US claims and is likely to counter them. The report quoted him saying, “India will likely seek consultation for non-compliance of WTO laws by the US. The US has done so many things which are WTO non-compliant and India has been tolerating it. There is a strong view in certain quarters that we should retaliate.”
It is worth mentioning here that India was blamed for discrimination against solar cells and modules made in US, owing to the requirement that solar power developers participating in phase-II of National Solar Mission use solar cells and modules manufactured only in India.
